Chapter 46

Chief Numa declared, “This case is now open. The victims will describe the event, then the two ‘gentlemen’ will have their turn to describe what happened.”

The two men looked over at the two girls, and worried about what was about to happen to them and their lives. John grinned at their discomfiture, and listened to what his wife had to say.

“The elder girl will be first to tell her tale. State your name before you relate your story.”

“My name is Marva. The other girl is my best friend, Jorla. We had volunteered to go collecting firewood; at least those bits small enough for us to carry. So much firewood has been collected in recent times that we have to go a long distance from the cave to find the stuff. Anyway, we had just started collecting when these two ruffians stepped out from the trees and took hold of us.”

Numa asked for clarification, “How did they take hold of you? In what way were you held?”

“Um ... I was held by that one,” she pointed, “And he put his arms round me at about shoulder height. I think the other one held Jorla by his hands on her upper arms. Have I got that right, Jorla?” The other girl said, “Spot on, Marva.” Marva continued, “They held us and told us that we were now their women, and that they would take us away, far away from here, and then we would be together.”

Chief Numa interrupted, “So neither man offered violence to you?”

“Not really. It was very frightening, but it was mostly the sudden shock of it all. I could see that the one holding Jorla was wearing a knife in a sheath at his waist, and I assumed the one holding me was also wearing a knife.”

“But neither showed their knives at the time?”

“No. They were bigger than us, so we couldn’t properly fight them off. Neither of us were prepared for this.”

“You DID have knives, though; am I right?” Both girls stopped short, realisation hitting them.

“Oh, yes. We never thought of them at the time,” the both admitted. Numa frowned at them. “That was not a good response, young ladies. I expect my tribesmen and women to be prepared to react immediately to any sort of attack. You girls failed to react as members of our tribe should. I am disappointed in you two.”

“Sorry, Chief,” they declared in unison, tears coming to their eyes. Numa relented. “As nothing serious happened in the end, I will forgive you, but you had better set up some training with our experts, so that you will be prepared should anything like this happen again. You should react automatically and be ready to defend yourselves. I expect you to be able to turn on your attackers and defeat them!” At this, the two men became even more terrified of the Chief. John whispered to them, “Most of our tribe could do that, you should know. You were lucky, this time.” This did not make the teenage men feel any better. If anything, it made them seriously realise that John could have killed them, back on the trail. Numa resumed her interrogation of the girls.

“So these men forced you to go with them. How? Did they brandish their knives?” The older girl admitted, “No. They pushed and shoved us around, to make us go with them, but they didn’t take out their knives; probably thought they didn’t need to.”

“And they were right. Did you at any time think of using your knives to fight them off?” The girl sobbed, “No, Chief. We were too upset and crying all the time. We thought we would never see our families and friends again.”

“It was at this point that I assume you met High Chief John?”

“Yes, Chief. He shouted, “STOP!”, or “HALT!” or something, and that was it. Everything went well from then on. He saved us.”

“We shall see. Go and sit down, you two. I now need to hear from these offenders, these male persons. High Chief John: Bring them before me.” John hardly needed to urge them, for the two lads – they were little more than that, he now accepted – rushed to stand where the girls had stood. John went to stand behind them as their jailor. Numa spoke again.

“You two: Names, tribal connections and reasons why you were in our territory, to begin with.” The elder man said, “Toma, not currently of any tribe. This is Loma, my friend. We were told by our former tribe that as there was a shortage of eligible women for mates, it was up to us to go out in the world and find our own mates, and not to return unless we had mates with us. We have been on the go for days, and up until today had not seen any worthwhile females. When we saw these two, we were delighted.”

“I see. Delighted, and so you threatened them with abduction! Not very friendly, was it?”

“But, Chief, we thought this was the way of things. A man goes out and finds a possible mate, then takes her as his own.” Numa demanded, “Why?”

“Why? It is the tradition, we were told.” She glared at them. “Not a very good tradition for the women, is it?”

“Now that you point it out, you are right. We never thought of it from the woman’s viewpoint. We thought she would see it as accepted tradition, as well.” Numa informed them, “Well, In this tribe, and some others, it is NOT a tradition any more. The new tradition – no, it is a rule – is that a woman gets to choose who her mate will be. She and the man will discuss their lives and see if they might be happy together. Once that is settled, they go to the Chief of HER tribe and discuss it further, for the Chief has to consider the good of the whole tribe. If the girl has a widowed mother, the man who wants to marry her has to help support the widowed mother as well, as he is taking away one of the mother’s food gatherers. If the man agrees to join his woman’s tribe, that will make it easier for him to help the mother. That is one example of the Chief’s need to consider the larger community. In some cases, more than one woman may like a single man enough to be willing to share him, and the Chief has to approve that as well. Recently a man from the fisher village on the coast married a girl from here and a girl from there, but both girls met first and agreed that they could live together with their man. Do you see the pattern that comes out of what I am saying? Mates are obtained by consent, not by force. A mate obtained by force has no obligation to remain with you. She can escape at any time, particularly if she meets a man who would look after her better than you. Marriage is a better option, where in front of the Chief you each accept the other for life, and the Chief pronounces you as married; which makes it official. Am I clear on the new rule about mates?”

“Yes, Chief.”

“Right. Give me your story about the encounter with the girls. Do you speak for both of you?” The younger man said, “Yes, Chief.” She stared at the older man, and indicated with her hand that he should speak.

“Well, Chief, as we were badly informed, we simply tried to get the girls to come with us, but we only pushed and pulled them; we never threatened them with harm! We didn’t want to harm them!”

“Your ‘trying’ was forcible enough to make them cry, as John saw when you met him.”

“We did not know how to go about it, Chief. No-one said, ‘this is how you persuade a girl to become your mate’; it was all, ‘Go and get yourself a mate’; as generalised as that. Your tribe seems to have worked out a better system.”

“Hmm ... at any time did you take out your knife when you were with the girls? Any time?”

“No, Chief. We didn’t have to, we felt. We were trying to get mates, not harm anyone!”

“Hmm ... High Chief John, what is your opinion about these two miscreants? Are they redeemable?” John voiced, “They seem to learn fast, if shown the correct way, Chief. If the girls don’t want them to be severely punished, then a spell of time with this tribe, learning a better way of living might not be a bad idea for these two young men.” Numa turned to the two lads.

“You two are very lucky that none of our tribe seem to want to have you killed, or maimed, or thoroughly punished in another way. I am minded to go along with the High Chief and order you to spend a period of time in this tribe, actively learning how to be men that are respected instead of being looked down on as criminals. If you are willing, your punishment will be three months learning in this tribe, and at the end of that you will be asked to report on what you have learned. If it is a satisfactory report, as judged by me and the High Chief, you will be allowed the choice to go free or remain with the tribe. If you remain, you will be free to seek a mate from the tribe, for we have sufficient unmated females to allow that. Do you agree? Do you wish to accept my judgement?” The two men had been listening intently to what Chief Numa had been saying, and now accepted that they were being let off lightly, much more lightly than they expected. They were nodding agreement before they even spoke.

“Yes, Chief!” said the elder, and the other repeated the same thing. Numa corrected them, “You say, ‘Yes, Chief. We agree to accept your judgement’” They stood together and repeated in unison, “Yes, Chief. We agree to accept your judgement,” then, “Thank you,” they both added, and John smiled. It was a first step towards integration. Numa declared, “In that case, High Chief John will escort the two offenders to an appropriate spot inside the cave, where they can have a place of their own to sleep. One of the requirements of this judgement is that the men must learn new abilities such as cooking food, hunting for meat, and gathering firewood as well as gathering spiky bushes for fencing in of animals. Other tasks will include fire tending and learning to be part of our soap-making trade. They will learn to make their own moccasins, and eventually learn what is required to become a warrior. They will learn the warrior trade from a female warrior, so that they can understand that no matter which sex you are, you can be dangerous in a fight. Take them away, John.” As John led them away to allocate them a sleeping place, and see what furs might be available for their use, the older youth mumbled to him, “Chief Numa is a powerful woman; quite frightening in how she controls everything around her. Quite scary, if you ask me.” John told him, just as softly, “Careful now, Toma. The woman you are talking about is my first wife!”

“What? You are married to the Chief? Her?”

“Yes. She is a very loving lady, and is carrying my first child. You have seen her in her persona as Chief of this tribe. She does a grand job at it, doesn’t she?”

“And how!”, Toma emphasised. “I can’t get over how women and men are treated equally! Women as warriors, and as Chief; wow!” His younger friend Loma, more practical, added, “How do you get a girl to want you as a mate, High Chief?”

“A much more direct approach, I see, Loma. The basics are simple: treat women as your friends, and you will see how each woman responds to you. Be clear in your mind about who are already mated, so that you do not cause offense, but we have a number of unmated girls in this tribe, due to the number of times we have rescued people from wanderer bands. Mostly, we killed the wanderer bands as unredeemable criminals, but for one group, we persuaded them to go and leave behind their captives. Many of those rescued were women and girls, some of whom elected to stay in this tribe, mostly where their own tribe had been destroyed. It also means we have a number of widows available. You should be aware that widows have good experience in the art of loving a man, so are worth having a good look at. An older woman can be very helpful to a younger man just setting out on becoming a family. Even if she has one or two children, the experience of a couple of ready-made children to be a father to, can be a wonderful learning experience.” Loma moaned, “But I want to be a father of my own children; offspring of my loins!” John looked him in the eye. “And what is to stop that happening? Widows often have at least ten years of child-bearing potential ahead of them. A few may be only about four hands of summers, for young men are those most likely to be killed in battle or in a hunting accident, leaving a lovely young widow behind. She is probably also a competent cook and good at home-making abilities; see what I mean?”

“I never thought of that. I just assumed I should try for a girl around my own age.”

“That is fine, but then you both have to learn a great deal about living together as a family group. If you are going to be a good provider for your family, you might want to have two mates; one your age and the other an older one steeped in home-making knowledge.”

“Two women? It was enough trouble trying for one! See what that got us?”

“Yes, your decision to avoid real violence got you a chance of a better life, young man. How old are you lads? How many summers?” Loma was hesitant, so Toma contributed, “I am three hands plus one in summers. Loma is nearly one less. No-one in our old tribe mentioned widows as possible mates. Why would that be?” John offered, with a wry smile, “It could be that the older men wanted you younger men out of the way, so they could have a chance at the young widows for extra wives. Male-dominated tribes often have that male viewpoint of wanting to be in control of as much as possible. In this tribe, while I may have a number of wives, it was not through controlling people. It was because these women and girls admired me and my approach to life; seeing women as important people in their own right. But, they had to convince my Numa that they were acceptable to her. She was the one who decided what should be the outcome. If you change your attitude and learn to respect women, you may find them willing to join your family group.” Toma snorted in disbelief. “And fish might fly!” John chortled. “Some fish DO fly a short distance, Toma, so your choice of words was unfortunate. Look, just ask any woman who is married to me; other folk will point her out. Ask her why she married me, and see what answer you get.” Loma said wonderingly, “You mean that, High Chief? They didn’t just marry you because of your high position?”

“That is for you to establish. I am happy to allow you to do the asking.” John went back to report to Numa.

“I have hopes for these two lads, Numa. If they had got away with our girls, the girls would have soon converted them; probably brought them back here as well. These lads are only in their teens, so quite impressionable.”

“Good. Now, I want you to lay out the pattern outside for where the new huts can be built. I think two rows, going downhill from the cave, with a wide empty area in the middle. Does that seem right to you?”

“Sounds fine, my darling. Had you thought about the size of the ... huts? Can we call them ‘houses’, for huts make them sound small?”

“Call them what you like, John. They are homes for families, whatever you call them. Make them large enough for a family with multiple wives, as we have one of two examples. The ‘houses’ should have some kind of divider to keep the cooking area away from the general living area. I used to hate cooking smoke drifting all over the hut.”

“Hmmm...” John mused. “Sleeping areas as well. We can either use wattle walls, or hanging hides as dividers, for we don’t have enough panels to spare for internal partitions. Have you thought about roofing?”

“No, that’s a point. The usual pointed thatched roof is not going to sit well on a square building, is it?”

“True. How about a roof made of another panel, sloping from front to back. All the rain will run off at the back, out of the way. We simply make the front panel taller, and cut the side panels at the correct angle to fill the gap to the roof. I’ll discuss it with Brando, as he knows what is the most practical way to achieve this. We should prepare foundations for the houses first.”

“Foundations? What do you mean?”

“Oh, you didn’t start with foundations for your huts? Just rammed in vertical posts for support?” Numa admitted, “I wouldn’t know, never having been involved in hut building. That was men’s work; girls did not see how it was done.”

“Well this man knows that for a secure structure, you need a foundation what will help it stay solidly in place. That often means digging a shallow trench and filling it part-way with small stones. That gives a solid base and helps with drainage from the walls. The walls then go in and are supported with more stones up to surface level. Keeping the walls vertical until they are fixed to each other is important, so we either use brackets, or we try something else.”

“Talk it over with Brando, John. Work it out between you.”

“Right. Can I borrow your two felons to help with the labouring?”

“Why not? It will let them see that any work they do for the tribe is worthwhile for us.” John found some cardboard packaging that had contained a sewing machine, and used the blank inside to draw his sketch of the land outside the cave, and the proposed layout of houses on it, so that everyone could see what was being planned. He left it with Numa for use in answering questions. In return, Numa despatched two female warriors to bring back Brando as soon as he was free. The ladies were equipped with survival knives and their spears, to cover any eventuality during their journey. Only one of them was married, so the other was hoping to cast an eye over the eligible men at the Farfarers. Before they left, John asked them to go over with Brando the need for wheeled supports for bringing back large chunks of firewood – or any other requirement for good logs. The lack of anything close to a roadway was a damn nuisance, thought John, but building any such roadway was a labour-intensive project that they were not in a position to enact. Most folk got along fine with a narrow trackway to walk along. Just as in 19th century single-track roads, the trackway widened at many places, allowing people to pass each other. In fact, John recalled, in some rural areas, such as the North Coast 500 route round the Scottish Highlands, there still were single-track paved roads with passing places. When John began to prepare to lay out the foundations for houses, he brought out stainless steel spades for cutting the trenches, and the two drafted young men stared at the unique tool. They had never seen anything like it, so John had to demonstrate how it was used. They were both amazed at how easily it cut into the turf. John demonstrated how to cut the outline of the trench, then slide the spade’s blade almost flat to get under the turf, and lift out the divot. He stuck to simple square turfs, rather than the more complicated long cut then slowly rolling up the turf once undercut. Thy were not looking to re-lay the turf elsewhere. If anything, it could be stacked to weather into compost later. Once the two men got the hang of the spade, they set to, following John’s instructions about straight lines. He marked the start and finish for each trench, which seemed to do a sharp turn then continue. They had no idea what they were digging trenches for, so after a while Toma ventured this question.

“High Chief, what are we making these shallow trenches FOR?”

“Oh,” John exclaimed, apologetic. “I should have told you. These trenches are for the house foundations. Once we dig them a bit deeper, we lay in large gravel from the stream, to half fill the trench. This acts like drainage from the house walls. I’ll explain more as we get further on.” The older man looked at the other. “We are building houses, when there is that big cave up there?” Loma was more savvy. “More people, less space in the cave, Toma, so they are expanding their homes.”

“Yes, I see that, but the cave goes further back: I could see that.”

“Do you want to live in the dark, Toma? I don’t.”

“Well, some of them seemed to be going into the dark every so often, and fetch things back. Someone must live back there, and look after their stuff for them.” John interrupted, tiredly, “Lads, this is not getting the digging done. Can we leave off the chat until it is time for a break?” Glumly, they did as he asked. John thought about himself and his two workers and told them a story.

“I once was hidden in a trench, watching what the enemy were doing, when two of their guards ambled up to where I was covered over. I thought, I hope the fuck they don’t stand on me!, but they didn’t. Instead, one of them pulled out his pecker and unloaded a stream of urine on the ground, with me hidden below. I lost the rag and exclaimed, “Aww, piss off!”, and immediately thought my life was up. Instead, he thought it was his mate that had spoken and replied, “No need to get fussed. I am just relieving myself, and it is time we were both relieved!” The other guard uttered a puzzled, “Eh?” then ignored him, so I survived that encounter.”

There was an awesome hush, as both boys giggled at the story, then burst into laughter. Toma, when he had recovered, said, “Was that true?” John replied, “Yes, it really happened. I didn’t dare tell my mates when I got back from that observing mission, as I felt so stupid.” That got him another laugh, and from that minute, his two felons became more agreeable as they worked. As John worked with them, making sure they kept to straight lines between marker sticks, his mind wandered. Gravel? What size of gravel do we need, and how do we sort out that size. Into his mind popped the word ‘riddle’ and he knew that if he had a decent sized riddle, that would make things easy down at the stream. He know the water flow would have done sorting of sizes, but there would be sections not properly differentiated. That was where a riddle would come in handy. Did they have one among the garden tools in the store room? He didn’t remember seeing such a thing. Perhaps Raka could go and rake around to settle it one way or the other. Telling the men he would be back as soon as he finished giving instructions to another person, he stuck his spade in the ground and walked up to the cave.

“Anyone seen Raka around recently?” he asked. Someone answered, “She went back to the darkness with a lamp a few minutes ago.”

John strode further in and gave a shout: “Raka? Are you there?” He heard a reply but had to wait until she made her way back.

“What is it, John? A problem?”

“No. A query. Do you know if there is one or more riddles in the store room?”

“What’s a riddle, John? I presume not a puzzle question, like ‘What belongs to you, but other people use it more than you do?!” John tried to think, then asked, “What is the answer?” Raka told him, “Your name!”

“Hah!” exclaimed John. “Clever!” Raka went back to the first question: “Anyway, what is a riddle?” John answered, “A circular flat basket of plastic or metal, with an open bottom criss-crossed by dividers, so that anything smaller than the gap will fall through. I am sure you will recognise it if you see it. Can you have a look through the store and check? It should be with the gardening tools, most likely.” Raka twisted her mouth querulously, but volunteered, “I can have a look. How wide is the basket?” John spread his hands to indicate it. “About this wide. Can I leave you to it, unless you have trouble finding one?”

“Certainly; I can manage. I keep going back there to examine the contents; fascinating stuff.” Raka seemed to find the things from the future as superior to anything she knew of before; she was probably right, even if John did not feel that way. To him, physical things were less important than how you dealt with people. John and his two workers had not done more than another two house foundations before Raka was coming down the slope, brandishing two riddles one in each hand.

“Well, John? Is this what you seek?” He took hold of them, one after the other, to compare them. They were both half-inch riddles, one being plastic and the other metal. Raka was curious about the difference.

“The metal one feels colder than the other one; why is that?” John tried to explain. “It has to do with the properties of objects. A fur never feels cold, unless it gets wet. What feels cold then is the water, rather than the fur. Fur traps air among the hairs of a fur, insulating it, and that is why it feels warm: it is not losing heat. Metals tend to lose heat readily, so that makes them easy to feel cold. They are good conductors of heat. Non-metals are poor heat conductors, and that includes most plastics. The plastic this riddle is made of is a non-metal material only made by people. It doesn’t exist in nature. The plastic basically remains at the temperature of the surrounding environment, and so it doesn’t feel very hot or very cold; just normal temperature.”

“So what is the advantage of metal, if it often feels cold to the touch?”

“Once you are able to heat it enough to melt it – not easy to do – you can pour in into a mould, and as it cools, it becomes that shape more or less for ever, unless it gets melted again. One of these shapes is the brackets we found in the store. We can use them to fix together two panels at a corner, then the panels stay fixed, if the brackets are fixed with metal screws. Plastic is not rigid enough to do a good job that way, nor is most wood.” Raka persisted, “So how do you make plastic? Heat it like metal?” John resorted to crude facts.

“Just like there are a number of metals, all with different properties, there are many, many plastics, made in different ways with different chemicals. The word plastic simply means it can be shaped and reshaped fairly easily. The simplest is made from the material I call cellulose, a constituent of many plants, including trees. Another is a form of resin; that yellowish/red substance that oozes out of some tree trunks. Like metals, Raka, we don’t have the capability to make plastics today, so talking about it doesn’t get us anywhere.”

“I know, but I just like to KNOW about things, like Brando likes to make things. Is it wrong to want to know things?”

“No, not wrong, but not very practical when the knowledge can’t take you anywhere.”

“But you think it is alright to make use of it, such as these riddles made from metal and plastic.”

“Yes, for the simple reason that it is practical to do so. You may not know how to make a rock, but you can make use of rocks for all sorts of purposes, such as using flint as a flaked tool to make knives, needles, saws and anything else that needs a sharp edge.”

“Ah, yes; practical is the answer. Just like clothes, John.”

“What? Clothes? What about clothes?”

“Every few days, you get a clean set of clothing to wear, don’t you?”

“Yes. So what?”

“How did they get clean? Your wives washed them in the stream and lain them out on tree branches to dry. Washing can be a hard task; bashing the wet clothes against a large rock, to get all the dirt out.”

“Oh. I should have known that, and thanked the ladies, shouldn’t I?”

“That was not what I meant,” said Raka. “It was the practical side of laundry: that is what we girls have changed. We adapted your soap and shampoo production to make a special soap for cleaning hides and furs.”

“You did? Wow!”

“Yes. It came about when Sheila asked about clothes washing procedure. Actually, she asked, ‘Can I have some shampoo to wash out my smalls?’ It turned out that she had on some underwear – panties she called the thing – and wanted to wash it because there was no more to be got; unless there is some hidden in the store room somewhere; I’ll get her to look. For my part, I cannot understand why she would want to wear such stuff, for it would just get in the way of you accessing my fuckhole, and I like you fucking me, John. These girls from your time must have to take their ‘smalls’ off every time they want to have sex with you, surely? A damn nuisance, if you ask me. Anyway, this got the rest of us thinking, ‘If shampoo can be used for washing small bits of clothing, can it be used for cleaning larger pieces, hides, bed furs, and so on?’ John’s mouth opened in surprise, and he came out with, “We men have blind spots at times. For all my talk of equality, I automatically expected the washing of clothes and bedding to be done by the women of the tribe. I am sorry for that lapse, Raka. We should train our boys to be able to do washing of clothes.”

“Yes, yes,” she muttered, but went on, “We found that neither the hard soap nor the shampoo did a perfect job on the washing of clothes in a running stream, so we varied our recipe and tried out a number of varieties on our clothing. Furs were the most difficult, as the hairs of a fur needed to be thoroughly cleaned, deep down, and so a more liquid version of the shampoo was needed. Sheila, who worked with us on the new stuff, called it ‘laundry liquid’. It has to be kept in a bag, like shampoo, and ... and I suggested when the bag was tied at the top, that we insert a hollow reed stem before closing it. My idea was that you could squeeze out some liquid through the reed onto the area to be washed, rather than it all being washed away by the stream and wasted. The girls liked my idea, and used it for the shampoo bags as well, for they found it is easier to get shampoo into your hair that way.” John almost exploded with excitement.

“Raka! You are our own Maker! Only a true maker could come up with such a practical solution to a defect. You are wonderful!” He grabbed the teenager and hugged her to him in delight. She hugged him back, and this changed to kissing each other. They were disturbed by Toma asking plaintively, “Excuse me? Are these ... things ... meant for us to use?” John and Raka broke off, and John announced, “These things are designed to sort stones into small and large. We need larger pebbles for our trenches, so these riddles will make the task much simpler for us. We take them to the stream where there is a lot of gravel; use our spades to shovel gravel into the riddle, then shake the riddle from side to side. All the tiny gravel, smaller than the hole size, falls through, leaving those pebbles that we can use.”